瑪利亞（Julie Andrews 飾）是一個年輕活潑的修女，喜歡在大自然下高聲歌唱，所以她常常忘記了修道院裡的規矩。院長認為瑪利亞並不屬於規矩嚴格的修道院。院長與眾嬤嬤商量後，決定安排瑪利亞到一位名叫特拉普（Christopher Plummer 飾）上校家當家庭教師。 上校的妻子去世多年，留下7個孩子，他要求對孩子嚴格管教。他告訴瑪利亞在他家的家庭教師都做不長久，都是因為孩子的惡作劇。瑪利亞果然也遭到了惡作劇，可是這位善良的老師並沒有告訴他們的父親，而是像個母親一樣照顧孩子，很快跟孩子打成一片。上校也漸漸在瑪利亞的引導下改變了對孩子們的態度。上校與瑪利亞之間發生了感情，他們完婚後回到了已被納粹佔領的奧地利，上校並不想為納粹辦事，一家人準備逃跑……

Engineer Jake Holman arrives aboard the gunboat USS San Pablo, assigned to patrol a tributary of the Yangtze in the middle of exploited and revolution-torn 1926 China. His iconoclasm and cynical nature soon clash with the 'rice-bowl' system which runs the ship and the uneasy symbiosis between Chinese and foreigner on the river. Hostility towards the gunboat's presence reaches a climax when the boat must crash through a river-boom and rescue missionaries upriver at China Light Mission.

Gertrude Lawrence rises to stage stardom at the cost of happiness.

Tish Gray had a baby and gave it up for adoption. She is contacted by a second childless couple who want her to have the husband's baby because of the wife's inability to have children. She accepts but finds that knowing the parents, and developing a relationship with them for the entire pregnancy complicates the simple arrangement.